问答题
Read the following poem and answer the questions.Anecdote of the JarI placed a jar in Tennessee,And round it was, upon a hill.It made the slovenly wildernessSurround that hill.The wilderness rose up to it,And sprawled around, no longer wild.The jar was round upon the groundAnd tall and of a port in air.It took dominion every where.The jar was gray and bare. It did not give of bird or bush,Like nothing else in Tennessee.
问答题
What shape is the jar? Where does the speaker place it?
【正确答案】正确答案：The jar is round and is placed in the wilderness, on a hill in Tennessee.
【答案解析】解析：答案见诗歌的第一节。
问答题
According to the second stanza, what happens to the wilderness around the jar?
【正确答案】正确答案：The wilderness is no longer wild.
【答案解析】解析：答案见诗歌的第六行。
问答题
What does the jar "take" everywhere? Of what does it "no give"?
【正确答案】正确答案：The jar, a piece of human art, leaves us an impression of human domination over the wildness, say nature. In this sense, the jar serves as an extension of the poet"s own drive to order. It achieves dominion over the chaotic wilderness. Thus, it "took dominion everywhere." The author also bestows the sterility on the jar as it is "gray and bare". In other words, living creature would not be born out of human creation. Therefore, his dominion over nature is an illusion, jus as the jar does "not give".
问答题
Explain in your own words the effect of the jar on the Tennessee wilderness. Does its effect seem positive in the first two stanzas? In the third? Why is jar an appropriate word?
【正确答案】正确答案：First the jar serves as an extension of the poet"s own drive to order and it is positive in the first stanza as it achieves dominion over the chaotic wilderness "It made the slovenly wilderness surround that hill." The jar does not itself move or change; it merely sheds influence. The source of its power is its perfection of empty form. It is "of a port in air," stately and imposing but also vacant, a mere circular opening in the air. The victory of the jar is evoked on the level of sound and image by the repetition of "round". In the third stanza, however, the imperfection of the jar, or the token of human art, is passively revealed as it was "gray and bare" and could not "give" birth to life. The "sterility" enable the audience to doubt the positive function of art. The jar is an appropriate word. A man-made artifact it is, thus it stands for human art.
问答题
How is a jar different from the wilderness? What might the jar represent?
【正确答案】正确答案：A jar is a man-made handicraft, representing human art. The wilderness is suggestive of a chaotic and shapeless situation, the essential feature of nature. The jar in Tennessee represents a purely formal principle of order, and this kind of order cannot satisfy the deepest needs of Stevens" imagination. He ultimately seeks not only to impose order on the external world but to integrate the mind and the world within a sentient unity of being. As long as he remains fixed within a dualistic conception of the world, this fulfillment will elude him.
【答案解析】解析：本题考查坛子与荒原之间的关系以及坛子的象征意义。
问答题
Do you think ambiguity makes a poem more memorable? More effective?
【正确答案】正确答案：Ambiguity does make a poem impressive and effective. Consider this poem. The essential characteristic of Anecdote of a Jar is an essential ambiguity: To place a jar on a hill in Tennessee is in itself an ambiguous (as well as strange) gesture. The nature of the object is also ambiguous: Is it to be considered a machine-made object, without aesthetic value in itself, an instance of anti-art? Or is it, on the other hand, to be considered a worthy example of utilitarian design? It is the nature of the readymade to inspire these questions without resolving them. Besides, the author"s ambivalent attitude towards art as the open ending of the poem shows, also makes the poem worth reading.